Past Chatter

Working his operation from Jacksonville, N.C., Bobby Goodson, owner of Goodson's All-Terrain Logging, is one of several pioneers of the method of "shovel logging" he's become somewhat famous for today, thanks to the Discovery Channel's "Swamp Loggers" series. The reality show, depicting Goodson and crew's work in the low-country swamps, helped propel the Discovery Channel to near the top prime time cable network ratings earlier this ...

Monday, June 28, was the day supporters of the Jason's Law trucking parking safety and security legislation were calling for a united front from the community of drivers and others in the industry toward its passage; I was on the road most of the day, and I'd be willing to bet others were in similar situations and missed that call. Among those requesting truck drivers to contact their legislators ...

A story in the Akron Beacon-Journal from last week detailed the inventing prowess of dump-truck driver for Barbicas Construction and former long-hauler Charlene Cook, of Akron, Ohio. She unveiled her gizmo, the Last Drop Bottle Buddy, at the Invention and New Product Exposition, or INPEX, outside Pittsburgh June 16-18. The Bottle Buddy is essentially a sturdy stand and a cup on which you ...

According to an interview published at the website of Esquire magazine, Ice Road Truckers star and Alaskan Dalton Highway hauler Lisa Kelly (pictured; photo by Rick Gershon of the History Channel) is not only the “sexiest trucker alive.” What’s more, she was speaking w/ Esquire writer Erik Price on sat phone from the Himalayas in Southeast Asia. “I'm shooting for another ...

Next time you ask if I've driven before, I can at least say "yes" before the qualifiers (well, "at 40 mph, if that," "with an automatic transmission," "no trailer on") begin. A visit to Schneider National headquarters in Green Bay, Wis., to bear witness to the truckload carrier's 75th Anniversary celebration June 10 yielded unexpected delights, let's say.  First, though, I got to try out one ...

If rumored body-mass-index caps ever become a reality for interstate truckers (however doubtful that is), 420-lb. Kelly Gneiting (pictured, as featured in a Feb. 2009 edition of ESPN magazine) may well be there to prove the regulatory faults. As a sumo wrestler, he's in top shape, he said in this recent story, on the website of the Denver Post. You might not know ...

Rick Sylvester (pictured) started making videos at his hometown church in Houston about five years ago. From there, he says, his online productions “just took off.”  Shortly after he started his trucking career, Sylvester launched a YouTube channel documenting his first year and a half as a driver, shooting, editing and posting his own videos about trucking school and time on ...

The team behind Mobil Delvac heavy duty diesel engine oil will sponsor the 35th annual Budweiser Dairyland Super National Truck and Tractor Pull, June 24-27 in Tomah, Wis. The event boasts six sessions of action-packed pulling over the course of the four days, and it's one of the largest motorsports events in the Midwest.  This year's competition is the only event on the ...

As I noted in my brief post yesterday, it's wonderful to see Jasmine "Jazzy" Jordan looking as happy as she does in this photo, taken just after her 3,162-mile run's finish yesterday in Times Square. Jazzy's father, Lee, had this to say about his daughter's happiness: "She deserves to be that happy. It’s tremendous that she made this." Here here. As ...

Jasmine "Jazzy" Jordan's father, Lee, forwarded this pic my way, taken after her finish just a couple hours ago in Times Square. Doesn't she look happy? Yes, I'd say she does. For my story about her run, check out this month's cover story in Truckers News.

Amid recent headlines trumpeting growing manufacturing activity, freight volumes and truck and trailer sales, it’s tempting to look at Rush Enterprises’ expansive new facility in Oklahoma City off I-40 at the Council Road exit as yet another sign of the growing consensus that the Great Recession is either over or nearing its close and the trucking industry is in full-bore recovery. ...

Carlile Transportation driver Jim "J.D." Dobbs sees "a lot of wildlife" on somewhat regular runs on the Dalton Highway in Alaska to and from the Prudhoe Bay oil fields. "Moose, caribou, things of that nature," he says. "Some are close calls – when you come over a hill on the way to Prudhoe Bay and a large herd of caribou may be crossing ...

If you know Mike "Mustang" Crawford, Overdrive's 2010 Driver of the Year, you probably hear from him from time to time with an epic, often quite hilarious story. Last time we checked in on the Prime-leased Missouri owner-operator here Crawford told of his rig's accidental involvement in the Miami MLK Day parade. Just yesterday, though, he called with another heck of a tale while I waited for an Omaha Orange-painted Bluebird bus ...

In July, Truckers News, via its photo group on Flickr.com, is embarking on a new monthly series of photo contests -- the winner will have his/her photo published in the magazine and will receive an instructional book on photography. Each contest will be themed, so it may require a little looking around/searching -- I'm posting this early on so you can ...

Jazzy Jordan reached the 3,000-mile mark yesterday as I was working on the story and vid below -- check it out for her father's call for all able truckers to join the run as it heats up to the finish line in Times Square next week. Photo courtesy the Jordans. 

Turns out Lee Jordan's early-May prediction that he and his daughter, Jasmine "Jazzy" Jordan, would be making their Times Square, New York City, finish point of Jazzy's run across the U.S. to benefit the St. Christopher Fund by a week from today was on-the-spot correct. I spoke with Lee (pictured) yesterday and he said the pair were in Joppa, Md., approximately 170 ...

Among drive-image-building efforts that are decades-long institutions are the yearly state truck-driving championships, which in 2010 will culminate in the final national competition Aug. 3-7 at the Greater Columbus Convention Center. The efficacy of the championships in the image arena was on full display in this story, published Sunday in the Springfield, Mo., News-Leader, about that state's own championships, held ...

Writer Mary Richardson, whom Atlanta-based Creative Loafing describes as a former editor with the Truckers Connection publication, had what she describes as "nightmares" during relatively modest spikes in fuel prices during the year 2006, shortly after she started working there. She "was having these apocalyptic nightmares about fuel prices getting so high that trucks would stop," she told Creative Loafing's Wyatt Williams, "causing ...

The star of last week’s episode of the History Channel television program Sliced was “tough, rugged and good-looking,” said makers of said star, a Mack TerraPro refuse truck that the show’s host, John McCalmont, showed backed up its exterior with EPA 2010 emissions-certified power in the guts. Each week, the Sliced host uses a bevy of tools to slice objects apart, ...

It's not exactly a big 10-4, but in her "Road Warrior" column in the Las Vegas Review-Journal a week ago, Adrienne Packer detailed her state's latest addition to the growing nationwide effort to pair state troopers with truckers to target four-wheelers' unsafe maneuvers around big trucks for citation. While Packer reflects a somewhat common feeling among the motoring public when ...